The American Yawp — Chapter Nineteen: World War I and Its Aftermath
Abridged for Intermediate-High Learners

World War I — called the Great War — toppled empires, created new nations, and changed the United States forever. Germany's Kaiser Wilhelm II built a powerful army and navy, and rival nations formed competing alliances for protection. On June 28, 1914, a Serbian nationalist named Gavrilo Princip assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary. Within weeks, Europe was at war. President Woodrow Wilson declared American neutrality, following George Washington's old advice to avoid a foreign alliance. The United States had the world's strongest industrial economy.

Armies dug a long trench network, and the war became a bloody stalemate. Germany used submarines to sink ships carrying supplies to Britain and France. In 1915, a German submarine sank the passenger ship Lusitania, killing more than a hundred Americans. Then Germany sent the Zimmermann Telegram, secretly offering Mexico the return of Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona if Mexico attacked the United States. Outraged, Congress declared war on Germany in April 1917. The nation was unprepared: it had no large army and no tradition of drafting soldiers. Congress passed the Selective Service Act, and millions of men registered for conscription. Black soldiers served in segregated units and were barred from combat. Women served too.

At home, the government worked to win public support. President Wilson created the Committee on Public Information, which used propaganda to present the war as a fight for democracy. But the war also brought repression. The Espionage Act of 1917 and the Sedition Act of 1918 punished dissent and protest against the war. German Americans faced mob violence, and some towns banned the German language. Congress passed the Immigration Act of 1917, which barred immigrants who could not read.

American soldiers arrived in France in huge numbers in 1918 and helped turn the tide. Germany's last great attack failed, and on November 11, 1918, Germany agreed to an armistice — a ceasefire that ended the fighting. More than 4.7 million Americans had served, and over 100,000 died. Europe lost far more: France and Germany each lost about 4 percent of their people. As the war ended, a deadly influenza epidemic swept the world. The "Spanish flu" killed an estimated fifty million people — more American soldiers died of the flu than in battle.

President Wilson traveled to France to shape the peace. His Fourteen Points called for open diplomacy, free trade, and a League of Nations to keep the peace through collective security. But Britain and France wanted to punish Germany. The Treaty of Versailles forced Germany to pay heavy reparations and accept blame for the war. Back home, Senator Henry Cabot Lodge led the fight against the League of Nations, arguing it would steal America's independence. After Wilson suffered a stroke, the Senate rejected the treaty. The United States never joined the League.

The war's aftermath brought turmoil. The Russian Revolution of 1917 fed American fears of communism. During the Red Scare, the government's Palmer Raids smashed radical groups, arresting more than four thousand people and moving to deport hundreds. In 1919 workers launched strike after strike — four million Americans walked off their jobs. Racial violence exploded in the "Red Summer" of 1919, when riots broke out in more than twenty-five cities. The Great Migration had carried thousands of Black southerners to northern cities, where competition for jobs fueled the conflict. Black veterans who had fought for democracy abroad now demanded it at home. In the Middle East, the Ottoman Empire collapsed, and Britain and France took control of its lands under a League of Nations mandate — really a new form of imperialism.

World War I made the United States a major world power, but it also shattered Progressive hopes and set the stage for a global depression and an even greater war.